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Female Amurtiger Maruschka swims in the water basin of her enclosure in the Hagenbeck Zoo in August 2020.
Around 600 of the endangered animals are now living in the Siberian wilderness again.
Photo: Christian Charisius / picture alliance / dpa
According to experts, there are more than 600 Amur tigers, also known as Siberian tigers, in the wild for the first time in Russia.
The trend is increasing despite poaching, said the general director of the Amur-Tiger Center, Sergei Aramiljew, on Saturday of the state agency Ria Novosti.
The Amur tiger, the largest living cat in the world, is one of the strictly protected species according to the IUCN classification.
The estimates are based on data from the monitoring of the animals.
The expert assumes that up to 100 young animals survived each year: "Now there are definitely more than 600 of these predators." According to him, a new tiger count is planned for the coming winter.
The last one took place seven years ago.
In Russia it happens again and again that Amur tigers attack people and the animals are then shot.
Because tigers from the Amur region on the border with China are popular with poachers for their fur, teeth and other body parts, every death of an animal is investigated in order to rule out or confirm poaching.
dak / dpa
